A couple of thoughts on the parking thing here… as well as CC&Rs and covenants.
– It’s not just Boston that it’s bad mojo to steal someone’s shoveled out street parking space. I lived in a suburb of Philly (old neighborhood that was a dense mix of single family homes, twin homes, and a few row houses.) Lawn chairs and trash cans were used to mark ownership… Didn’t matter if it was the spot in front of your house… if the neighbor shoveled it – they had the right to use it. Fortunately I had a driveway and garage… so my roommate and I could park off the street.
– My neighborhood was subdivided in the 1890’s. My title restrictions, dated from that time, restricted me from having a tannery, a stable, or a boarding house. I was semi worried I’d be busted on the boarding house since I had a roommate for about 6 of the 8 years I lived there. But I guess 2 people in a 4 bedroom twin was not quite a boarding house.
– I was probably labeled undesirable. I wasn’t Irish (though I look it) and the rest of the neighborhood was. Even worse – my roommate was black. But they were nice and accepted me, and later my roommate.
– My current neighborhood has no HOA/CC&Rs etc. Every house has a 2 car garage. Of the approximately 40 house on my street probably 5 of us park both cars in the garage. Many park in the driveway… but probably 50% or more park on the street. They’d rather keep their expensive cars (mercedes, lexus, bmw’s.) on the street, so they can keep their boxes of crap in the garage. Makes no sense to me.
– We had a neighbor ask us to ask our tenant not to park in front of their house. No problem. Another neighbor is aggressive about getting parking control out to chalk tires if he sees a car parked too long. Again – that’s his business and doesn’t affect me.
